automatic electronic flash units

Flash units are usually fired with a switch in the camera shutter to synchronize the flash with the shutter opening. A contact in the camera’s flash shoe (hot shoe) or a flash lead connects the unit with this shutter switch. The shutter contact usually closes the instant the shutter is opened. A focal plane shutter must fully uncover the film (generally at a shutter speed of...

dubbing

Dubbing is often employed in the original-language version of a sound track for technical reasons. Filmmakers routinely use it to remedy defects that arise from synchronized filming (in which the actors’ voices are recorded simultaneously with the photography). Synchronously recorded dialogue may be unclear or inaudible in a long-distance shot or because of accidental air traffic overhead, or...

high-speed photography

Generally the event photographed is made to trigger the exposure (the current pulse to operate the shutter or flash or spark source) to ensure correct
synchronization. Examples are bullets interrupting a light beam to a photocell or self-luminous phenomena (explosions) triggering the system via a photocell circuit. The event and the exposure may be also triggered together by a signal from a...

motion-picture technology

It is usual to generate some kind of signal in synchronism with the intermittent when an auxiliary, magnetic-tape sound recorder is used, so that the sound record can later be synchronized exactly with the picture. The sync-generator provides a record of the speed of the camera motor; each frame of picture causes 2.5 cycles of a 60-hertz pulse to be recorded on the sync-track of the sound tape....

Precise synchronism must be maintained between camera and recorder so that sound can be kept perfectly matched to the visuals. (Lack of perfect synchronism is most conspicuous in close-up shots in which a speaker’s lips do not match his voice.) On some occasions several cameras shoot a scene simultaneously from different points of view while only one sound recording is made, or several sound...

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